Just the other day, I wrote a little about “cultural appropriation” and how I relate the topic — for better or worse — with Sagittarius. Unfortunately, topics like that go right over the heads of many people, especially youthful, idealistic Sagittarius types.

It’s interesting that Ricardo Montalbán was a Sagittarius. He was already a star long before I was born, but I remember him being everywhere when I was young. The thing that kids might not understand today is that I had no idea where Montalbán was from; I just accepted him as that suave, foreign guy with a smooth accent.

The world was a different place in the seventies and early eighties when Montalbán was at the peak of his career. There were not a lot of foreign actors working in Hollywood, and the few who did seemed to have a similar Jack-of-all-ethnicities résumé. They would play whatever role they were offered with relish. Montalbán, for instance, was an Italian movie star in “Sweet Charity,” a Japanese businessman on “Hawaii Five-O,” an Indian madman in “Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan,” and the pitchman for “rich Corinthian leather.” Corinthia, by the way, is in Greece. I think I remember him playing an Arab Sheik, too.

The funny thing is that Montalbán has a natal chart that indicates the sort of versatility and ambiguity that defined his career. His planets are quite evenly spread out in a splay-type configuration. A splay chart is actually rare because it’s far more common to have stelliums present in a natal chart because of the proximity of Mercury and Venus to the sun. With those three variables relatively close to one another most of the time, the chances of having a splay-type chart are reduced substantially.

But not in the case of Montalbán. Astrologically speaking, he was a little of everything, with his planets well-spaced and well-aspected throughout his chart. In my new book, I discuss how easy it is for a Sagittarius native to take on various roles. Montalbán was no exception. Fortunately for him, he was born in an era where he could be anything he wanted to be.